What Dietitians Get Wrong About Food

0:00 One of the things you write about in your book is that the Academy

0:03 of Nutrition is behind supportive I should say of a plant-based diet.

0:10 Is that still the case?

0:12 And then let's get into the nuances because that word is very vague.

0:17 What therefore?

0:19 Yeah, you know, the the entire Academy was I mean,

0:22 you can read about it in the book.

0:23 The story of how it came to be is pretty even

0:26 our nutrition guidelines the initial ones came to be is bizarre.

0:29 Right?

0:30 And I think you know, we we've seen over the last several years,

0:33 you know, kind of that movement towards plant-based.

0:35 I feel like we're starting to see people coming back from it a little bit.

0:39 Um, but you know, the Academy is is mostly sponsored by processed foods.

0:42 I believe they're still sponsored by the soy industry.

0:45 Um, gosh, you know, a few of the other like plant-based drinks.

0:49 And so, you know, they still heavily proponents of whole grains and you know,

0:54 meat alternatives and they also stand behind saturated fat being bad for you.

0:59 So, yeah, it's just it's bad.

1:02 I mean, some of their continuing educations are almost embarrassing to read.

1:06 Like it's just it's it's outdated science.

1:09 It's it's you know, things like saturated fat

1:11 being bad for your heart or, you know,

1:13 eating every few hours being good for you.

1:16 Um, hence you know, when I was at my new diet just in this like 2009,

1:20 they were sponsored literally by Coca-Cola.

1:23 You know, Coca-Cola, Pepsi, soy joy and I was like this is ridiculous.

1:26 Even before I understood low carb nutrition.

1:28 I'm like you can't be sponsored by something and not you know,

1:32 they have this really bizarre statement.

1:34 I'll see if I can write it down here online about their sponsorship.

1:36 It says like our sponsors don't affect our policies or how we you know,

1:40 I'm like what the hell it does.

1:41 What do you mean?

1:42 What is sponsorship before?

1:43 You you you act in a way to represent these things you're sponsored by.

1:47 Like well, that's like politics.

1:49 They give you money.

1:49 You are that's you know, that's why we shouldn't have corporate lobbying,

1:52 but that's not the conversation for another day.

1:54 Um, gosh, yeah, it's it's so frustrating.

1:58 I think it was 2014 that the New York Times

2:01 published an article that the Academy was literally taking funds.

2:04 So, you know, they get funds obviously from people

2:06 with their yearly fees which I don't do.

2:08 You don't have to do.

2:10 Um, and they were investing in Coca-Cola.

2:13 And they said, oh, that's you know, once again,

2:15 oh, that doesn't affect our policy or whatever.

2:17 It's like you don't you're supposed to be representing all

2:19 dietitians and you're taking our funds and putting it in Coca-Cola.

2:24 Like I don't know, maybe you say

2:25 that's smart investing and they're making money,

2:26 but to me that's a huge conflict of interest.

2:29 Cuz don't you want Coca-Cola to do well if you're investing in Coca-Cola?

2:32 Like oh my gosh, it just makes me like it just feels icky.

2:36 It just feels it feels so slimy.

2:38 It feels like everything as as nutrition

2:40 professionals we should be advocating against,

2:42 you know, these we know these foods are bad.

2:44 We know they're destructive to human health.

2:46 We know that non-fatty alcoholic liver disease is

2:48 increased exponentially with the increase of these sugar-sweetened beverages.

2:52 Yet here we are investing in them.

2:54 Get out of here.

2:56 It's crazy.

2:57 And one of the things preparing for this I've heard you talk about and it

3:01 really clicked for me is the fact

3:03 that it's not going to get dietitians saying okay,

3:07 Coke is something we recommend or pushing it upon their clients.

3:13 It's the middle ground where when people ask about it,

3:17 the dietitian could say, okay, in moderation.

3:22 Talk more to that.

3:24 So, it's so brilliant.

3:25 You know, I see these I cuz I never,

3:29 you know, I I practiced in the clinic until 202019.

3:33 You know, I think I left or in 2020 is when I actually left.

3:36 And I never saw a dietitian go into a room, you know,

3:39 and I witnessed heart heart disease education, diabetes You name it.

3:43 I witnessed it and gave it.

3:45 It never like in a handout we said it never said like drink soda, drink Pepsi.

3:49 Um, but if a patient asked like, hey, I like Pepsi.

3:52 What do you think about that?

3:54 It was, oh, well, just have it in moderation.

3:56 You know, cuz once you're if you're just taught moderation,

3:59 then we don't want to restrict people.

4:01 We don't want to, you know,

4:04 it it makes everything so arbitrary because moderation has no definition.

4:08 You know, I when I think of moderation, I think of like,

4:11 oh, I don't know, once or twice a week.

4:13 Somebody might think like, oh, that's once a day.

4:15 Someone might think that's once a year.

4:16 Someone might think that's three times a day instead of drinking it all day.

4:20 But in reality when you say moderation,

4:23 um, you know, there's two problems with that.

4:25 One is the first problem I just talked about is it's completely arbitrary.

4:28 It has no definition.

4:30 The second one is it would be like telling someone to to moderate,

4:34 you know, cigarettes.

4:35 It's it's addictive.

4:37 There's tons of research that nicotine is, you know, cigarettes are addictive.

4:41 So, it's like telling someone to moderate

4:43 foods that are literally designed to be addictive.

4:46 It's like you know, here they are getting permission to eat

4:49 these, but now they can't stop eating

4:50 these because they change our brain chemistry.

4:53 It's Yeah, it's horrible, but once again, it's it's such a whacked out system

4:58 to where these processed foods are sponsoring the Academy.

5:01 So, the Academy's telling people to okay to eat these processed foods, you know.

5:06 Not to mention we're in this position now where over 90%

5:09 of people are metabolically unhealthy and we've been living this radical

5:15 lifestyle and eating this radical diet in moderation just isn't

5:20 going to get us back to where we need to be.

5:23 No, and I mean, that's one of my like taglines

5:24 is we're not going to medicate or moderate out of this.

5:27 Like there's you absolutely cannot.

5:30 You you have to you have to say like I am willing to be radically different.

5:35 And radically different unfortunately it should just be like I'm willing

5:38 to live and be a normal human and eat real food.

5:41 But that's it's so unusual to eat two

5:44 to three times a day eating low carb real food.

5:47 Like that is incredibly unusual.

5:50 Um, it and it shouldn't be.

5:53 It should it should be the norm.

5:55 It should be like, hey, we eat two to three times a day.

5:58 Um, you know, if you're metabolically healthy,

6:00 incorporate some seasonal whole carbs.

6:02 If you're not, you just really focus on proteins and fats.

6:05 But yeah, it's it's a mess.

6:08 It's a big mess and you see it even starting young.

6:10 Like I get upset, you know, my non-existent children are perfect.

6:14 Always say that.

6:15 Um, cuz I mean, I don't have kids.

6:17 But man, sometimes I see kids.

6:18 I visited my sister.

6:20 I I have three older sisters.

6:21 My next older sister lives in California.

6:24 And so, um, right outside of Anaheim.

6:25 So, staying you know, Anaheim is where Disneyland or whatever is.

6:29 And so, I was running in the morning and I'm like,

6:31 my god, like his eyes It was like a hard-boiled eggs with legs.

6:37 What are these kids not just like chubby, but like obese?

6:41 I mean, these kids are like five or seven years old.

6:43 Like that breaks my heart.

6:44 That's not their fault.

6:45 And to piggyback off this moderation piece,

6:49 to me we got to talk about fruit because a lot

6:53 of the fruit has been hybridized and it's just so sweet.

6:58 I think a lot of times people can

7:00 wrap their heads around white sugar, processed foods.

7:04 But if you're in that position of these kids

7:07 that you're talking about or somebody metabolically unhealthy,

7:11 you likely need to cut the fruit out or at least

7:16 drastically bring it down because you're in a position

7:20 again that is so critical and so far down

7:24 the continuum that you need to be radical to get back.

7:28 I love that you said that and I appreciate

7:30 that because this is where the confusion comes in.

7:32 I see people arguing on Twitter.

7:34 Um, like oh, fruit isn't bad for you.

7:36 Nobody got diabetes from eating fruit.

7:38 And if you're saying somebody's been eating chicken and salad and, you know,

7:44 walking a few miles a day and having a banana, then no, they're fine.

7:48 That's no big deal.

7:50 But if you are already metabolically sick, and I'll give you an example.

7:53 I people I worked with at Ona, somebody whose blood glucose is 250 normally.

7:58 Once again, uh, we'll just say 250 waking.

8:01 Normal should be under 100.

8:03 If they eat an orange, their blood sugar is going to go to like over 300.

8:10 Are we saying that oranges are inherently bad and nobody

8:12 should ever eat an orange or they're going to spontaneously combust?

8:15 No, we're not saying that, but we're saying like you said,

8:17 when you're so far down the continuum, you have to be drastic.

8:22 In my experience, it behooves you to be drastic to say like,

8:25 I can't have things.

8:26 Cuz once again, your body is completely saturated with glucose.

8:29 So, you need to reduce or completely get rid of the glucose.

8:33 And I that's a huge confusion with type 2 diabetics.

8:36 If you are a type 2 diabetic, there's no room at the inn.

8:40 That means, you know, no carbohydrates.

8:42 Once again, I in the my book, you know, I use the hoarder's house.

8:45 Like there's nothing left.

8:46 Don't bring anything else in.

8:48 You need to get some of the stuff out by moving around

8:51 and by reducing your carbohydrates so the body can burn some of it.

8:54 So, yes, fruit.

8:56 I am, you know, I just just for whatever reason, I'm not a huge fruit person.

9:00 I mean, I like some seasonal berries.

9:02 I certainly can supplement my my running diet with fruit.

9:05 I think for young, you know, I've got in my nephew 16.

9:08 He plays soccer.

9:09 He eats a bunch of fruit.

9:10 That's fine.

9:11 He's a young healthy boy.

9:12 But just thinking that people who are metabolically unhealthy should be

9:16 eating a ton of fruit is a bad idea because yeah, it's very high in sugar.

9:21 Can you eat fruit at some point

9:23 once you reverse your, you know, metabolic health?

9:25 Most likely.

9:26 But you you you we have to we have

9:29 to take it into account where we're at right now.

9:32 That's why I would encourage anybody like,

9:34 you have to be careful listening to this person or that person, even me.

9:37 Do your own research.

9:38 But if you're very sick, you need to be focusing on what does your body need?

9:43 If your body has extremely high glucose,

9:45 your body doesn't need more glucose from and it doesn't

9:48 matter if it's from an orange or from a Snickers bar.

9:51 Your body doesn't know.

9:51 It breaks down to the same thing.

9:53 I think another good thing in that realm to talk

9:56 about when it comes to plants is the anti-nutrients.

10:00 So, we have the sugar specifically in fruit.

10:03 But then the other challenge is things like phytates, oxalates, lectins.

10:10 Depending on the plant, you get the double whammy of the anti-nutrients as well.

10:15 That was my like kind of extreme like worry

10:18 with people going on these very um plant-based diets,

10:21 you know, especially like women and young women eating a lot of rice,

10:25 eating a lot of quinoa, eating a lot of salads, you know,

10:28 eating a lot of things that are have a lot

10:29 of fiber but also have a lot of phytic acid,

10:32 which combines, you know, they form covalent bonds with calcium and iron.

10:36 And those tend to be two things that are

10:38 relatively low in the human diet, you know?

10:41 And so And once again, does that mean if you're a metabolically healthy person,

10:45 you should never eat anything with phytic acid?

10:47 Of course not.

10:48 But that has become a very big part of our diet,

10:52 these grains and nuts and seeds.

10:54 And then we're not having a lot of the the meats and you know,

10:58 the fish and some of the um you know, healthier fats like avocados.

11:03 And so when you do that, you potentially cause problems that we see, you know,

11:08 people have a lot of issues with um you know,

11:10 we see more people with bone issues at young age.

11:13 People that have a lot of issues with their teeth,

11:14 you know, your teeth are bone.

11:16 So, you're having a lot of cavities and other things,

11:18 you probably need less phytic acid, probably more saturated fat, more minerals.

11:22 Um yeah.

11:25 And so it's just we we put we kind of have the emphasis in my opinion reversed.

11:28 Like we put this like every as much plants as possible and a little meat,

11:32 where I feel like we need to have much more meat and much

11:34 more fat and then use plants in uh as a supplement to your goals,

11:39 your metabolic health.

11:41 Um And yeah, I know there's some people that would disagree and say like,

11:43 oh, I eat all these plants and I'm perfectly healthy.

11:46 Great.

11:47 I'm glad.

11:48 I'm glad that you know, but that that is not my overwhelming experience.

11:52 When it comes to phytic acid,

11:54 is it binding to nutrients just within the food that has the phytic acid?

11:59 Or if you're eating mixed diet

12:01 and you're getting some good quality animal nutrition,

12:05 is that going to affect the meat as well?

12:08 Yeah, like if you're let's say, you know,

12:10 eating something like just grains even with um we

12:15 see this a lot with uh even with iron,

12:17 you know, they say don't take a lot of like tannins or don't have,

12:20 you know, some of those things.

12:22 Um I'm trying to think of what other

12:23 good example like teas and coffees and stuff.

12:25 You want to try to have that separate from what you're eating.

12:29 And that doesn't mean like let's say you have a cup of coffee with something

12:32 high in iron and so you can't not going to completely absorb any of it,

12:35 but it is going to bind to some of that.

12:37 So, so yeah, you know,

12:40 I it's I just get so frustrated with the just the Once again,

12:49 a lot of people don't even know that.

12:50 They think like I just need to eat.

12:52 And I'm not saying once again the fiber is bad

12:54 for you or that you should completely eliminate phytic acid,

12:56 but just being aware.

12:58 You like you need to see like where is my health right now?

13:00 Like where are my goals, you know?

13:02 And And that's another thing that if you are

13:04 feeling super fatigued and you get a lab panel,

13:06 you know, I always encourage women to to get your iron checked,

13:08 get your ferritin checked.

13:10 That's something we often see is very low in women.

13:12 So, and if your ferritin is very low, you really need to consider, you know,

13:16 increasing your your red meats or even potentially

13:19 taking a supplement depending on how low it is.

13:21 As you talk about iron and red meat,

13:24 this is a good place to talk about bioavailability.

13:27 And this is something you're big on, the fact that just

13:31 because on a nutrition label we see a certain amount of something,

13:35 when it comes to plants,

13:38 those aren't always what you're going to end up absorbing.

13:41 Yeah, bioavailability is something What is it bioavailable?

13:45 I mean, like you said, it just means what do we actually absorb?

13:48 And I love I will continue to use this analogy cuz

13:51 I love the fact that like if I wrote you a check,

13:53 I say, "Jesse, it was really nice to chat with you.

13:55 Here Here's a check for a thousand dollars." And you're like, "Wow,

13:58 this is amazing." And you take it to your bank and they're like,

14:00 "This girl's got seventeen dollars in her bank

14:02 account." And you're like, "Oh man,

14:04 that's BS." It doesn't matter that I wrote it to you for a thousand dollars.

14:07 It might Can you actually access the funds?

14:09 You know, and that's what bioavailability is.

14:12 It doesn't matter that spinach has,

14:14 let's just say, you know, three milligrams of iron.

14:16 Your body cannot access it and break it down.

14:19 It is not very bioavailable.

14:21 Right?

14:22 And so it's effectively useless to you just

14:24 like unless they give you the seventeen dollars.

14:26 You know, most of that thousand dollars is useless to you.

14:29 So, you want to have things that have high bioavailability.

14:33 And those tend to be things that are like lower in fiber and anti-nutrients,

14:36 which obviously protein is and a lot of the um you know,

14:39 fats like some of the like fats um DHA, EPA,

14:43 things that are high in fish or even like,

14:45 you know, saturated fats that are in beef,

14:47 they're going to be higher in um or they're going to help

14:50 your body absorb those fat-soluble vitamins D, E, A, and K.

14:54 So, yeah, a lot of things in plants are just not very bioavailable.

14:58 And the fact that they're not very bioavailable

15:00 mean the human body can't use them very well.

15:03 Once again, doesn't mean you can't ever eat plants,

15:05 but to me that means you should probably

15:07 not depend on them as your sole source nutrition.

15:10 You touched on fiber.

15:12 Let's bring that in, a controversial topic.

15:14 Yeah.

15:15 Somebody eating the way you've been describing,

15:18 generally they're going to really cut down on their fiber.

15:21 If they're worried about pooping, their microbiome,

15:25 bring fiber in and talk about how you think about it.

15:28 Yeah, my opinion on fiber has changed a little bit.

15:30 You know, I used to be like, hey, nobody needs fiber ever, who cares?

15:33 It causes all these problems cuz I saw people get supplemented with fiber,

15:36 especially in the ICU, and it's not.

15:39 I mean, if anything, it's like, hey, I'm having severe diarrhea,

15:42 they get, you know, these Benefiber packets and it almost never helped.

15:46 And you know, when I first started carnivore, low carb,

15:49 and then ketogenic diets, very minimal fiber and felt great, had no issues.

15:54 You know, you have to make sure you're getting enough fat.

15:56 Over time, I think it makes sense to incorporate some type of fiber

16:00 cuz just like we were nobody was ever pure carnivore throughout time,

16:03 we eat some grasses and roots and whatever during famine.

16:07 You know, and nobody was ever purely plants, nobody was ever purely meat.

16:10 So, I do think having some fiber can

16:12 be beneficial potentially at points for for microbiome.

16:15 Um but yeah, in general I think we kind of overblow you know,

16:20 fiber being this like be-all end-all helping everything because once again,

16:24 you know, super high-fiber diets,

16:26 you're going to potentially bind to some vitamins and minerals.

16:30 So, I would say for most people it makes sense,

16:33 especially if you're doing a lower carb diet,

16:34 just enjoy some of the fiber or you're getting fibers from, you know,

16:38 avocados are rich in fiber,

16:39 you're going to get them from any type of vegetables you have.

16:42 But I don't necessarily think that um you know,

16:45 going out of your way to have a massive amount of fiber is really important.

16:49 Okay, let's pivot off fiber into the microbiome as a whole.

16:53 And your thoughts on fermented foods, probiotics,

16:57 short-chain fatty acids, share your thoughts in that realm.

17:02 Yeah.

17:03 Yeah, I mean, I feel like Mary Ruddick is probably a better person to talk

17:07 to you about this, but I do think um I feel like if anybody tells you like,

17:11 this is how to eat for the perfect microbiome, like you should be like,

17:14 you need to get out of here cuz nobody knows.

17:16 You know, your microbiome definitely reflects

17:18 like things you've eaten, you know?

17:21 So, whatever region of the world you're in, people eating different diets,

17:24 their microbiomes are going to be very

17:26 reflective of what they're eating, you know?

17:28 And they did do some studies on like, you know, low carb,

17:31 ketogenic diets and they had the same alpha diversity as somebody eating,

17:34 you know, a higher um fiber, uh kind of more of the traditional diet.

17:39 So, but yeah, I mean,

17:40 we know that we people have fermented things throughout history, you know,

17:44 as far as like yogurts, kefirs, you know, the carbohydrate,

17:47 one of the main ones I eat, sourdough is fermented.

17:50 I think there's something to that.

17:51 I certainly think, you know, when you have, you know, fibers,

17:54 you're going to have some of those short-chain

17:55 fatty acids and that seems to be beneficial.

17:58 Um but yeah, I don't know if it's just taking random probiotics,

18:03 I I wouldn't do I don't do that, but I do think if you're going

18:05 to be eating um I do think it

18:07 makes sense to have some cultured products just because,

18:10 you know, that that does you know, create some more diversity.

18:13 All right, last question for today.

18:15 As we wrap up, somebody who has stuck

18:19 with us throughout the almost two hours here, they're ready to take the plunge,

18:24 drop the carbs, let's give them the really

18:27 high-level playbook of how they walk out of this.

18:31 Okay, cool.

18:32 So, you never want to feel deprived or hungry.

18:35 I remember when I first started this, it kind

18:37 of scared me how much meat I could eat, you know?

18:40 Um Allow yourself just to you know, to eat to be satiated.

18:45 Um I would focus two to three times a day, ruminant animals,

18:50 like I said, beef, lamb, um adding butter, if you like, non-starchy vegetables.

18:56 I think those are fine to add in as well.

18:59 Drink a lot of water.

19:01 Take some electrolytes, you know, get online,

19:03 you can Amazon, Google, keto electrolytes.

19:06 Um consider the drink Unimate.

19:09 You know, I have a link if people are interested in that to learn

19:11 a little bit more about what that's about or that's on my website.

19:14 Uh yeah, it's really basic.

19:17 Three times a day, protein, you know,

19:19 ideally animal protein and non-starchy vegetable if you want.

19:23 Add a little bit of fat, whether that's butter, coconut oil, some avocado.

19:27 You know, try I always say try to sit when you eat.

19:30 Chew a little bit, that helps.

19:32 Um and repeat.

19:36 Give yourself a full thirty days, you know,

19:38 I think people you don't like it after a day or two days.

19:42 Um commit to yourself, say I'm going to do this.

19:44 And so when your friends are like, hey, we're eating pizza, you know,

19:47 say, "Ah, okay, I'll come hang out, but I'm actually eating this way,

19:50 you know?" And for somebody needing that whole

19:53 piece like we talked about early in the conversation,

19:56 they've been knocked down by a lot of different diets over the years,

20:00 a lot of different advice.

20:01 They feel like the best they can do is just hold where they're at.

20:05 What would you say to them?

20:06 Once again, your body and your brain have such a tremendous capacity to heal.

20:10 And if you're somebody who just you're going through it, you're struggling,

20:15 maybe it's better for you to do like a step-down approach.

20:19 Like let's say you're just eating like absolute

20:21 garbage right now and you even know it.

20:23 Okay, well, you know what?

20:25 How about for the next week we just drink water instead of soda.

20:29 And then after that, instead of, you know,

20:32 and and you can work with somebody that can help you really step this down.

20:35 But there's nobody listening to this that is too

20:38 far gone because you have your brain is functioning,

20:40 you have the capacity to listen to this.

20:43 And also just connect with somebody, you know, connect with me,

20:45 connect with another ketogenic dietitian out there, you know, commit.

20:50 And you will be blown away.

20:52 You can be a completely different person in 6 months.

20:55 You can change your entire life in as little as 3 months.

20:58 Since you made it to the end of this clip,

21:00 I know you're going to love the full episode.

21:02 Click here to watch.

21:03 I'll see you over there.

21:04 We are not going to medicate or moderate out of this.

21:07 We have great data.

21:08 Tons of clinical published trials on people

21:10 reversing type 2 diabetes with lower carbohydrate diets.

21:13 But if you're very sick, you need to be focusing on what your body needs.

21:17 If your body